


Shadow Waltz

by Aithilin



Series: NyxNoct Fall-Winter 2019 [2]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Established Relationship, Fluff, Hidden Relationship, M/M, Slow Dancing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-01
Updated: 2019-12-01
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:55:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21623377
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aithilin/pseuds/Aithilin
Summary: Nyx was resigned to watching the Prince dance his way across Lucis, consoled by the fact that he was the only one to see the real Noctis.
Relationships: Noctis Lucis Caelum/Nyx Ulric
Series: NyxNoct Fall-Winter 2019 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1557886
Comments: 5
Kudos: 40





	Shadow Waltz

Balls were an expectation within the Citadel. They were expected across Lucis in some way— a royal tour that kicked off the formal holiday season started with a party that seemed to light up the Citadel itself and dragged the royal family on a tour of the kingdom in their care. 

The holiday season began in the late summer— when the nights started to consume more and more of the daylight and the harvests across the kingdom started to come to fruition. It crept from the rocky western shores of the Styrian Swells first, the fruitful fields of Cleigne inviting bonfires and harvest mazes beneath the autumn waves of crimson, gold, and silver leaves. The ranchers of Duscae gathered apples and peaches from boughs nearly broken beneath the weight of their fruit; barns filled with communities and fences bore the baskets of orchard harvests, herds of garula lumbered through their grasses with traditional decorations decorating their tusks. And Leide flowered beneath the cooling longer nights when curtains of rains pushed over the rolling hills that lined the Lucinia Sound. 

And each year, Nyx was pulled along in their wake. 

He had watched as Noctis danced with ladies in the glow of Lestallum, the heat of the meteor shards beneath the city rising as steam around him and his partner. He had watched the dusts of Ravatogh swirl around the Crown Prince as he waltzed with the princess of the hunters, laughing at the adventurous stories that pass between them in the charcoal hills and amid the embers of the mountain. He had stood on duty as Noctis made a farm girl blush in her crown of autumn leaves, a sly smile on the prince’s lips as he greeted her with a kiss to her knuckles. 

Nyx had stood, silent and stoic, as Noctis danced his way across the kingdom’s autumn with the changing colours and fading light. 

By the time they had returned to the Citadel, the grey and damp start of winter had started to seep in. 

But the Citadel was ablaze with the festive lights. The Crown City crowned with the autumn colours artificially recreated against the cold start to winter with colourful strings of lights. The seasonal wave of warmth that had been building and growing since the westernmost shores of the kingdom was about to break across Insomnia in a final swell.

And the Citadel was in the centre of the maelstrom of light and colour and warmth. 

The final ball of autumn was the first of winter. 

Nyx stood guard as the night dragged on around him, watching the decadence of the Lucian nobility swirl through the room in lace and silks. 

He watched Noctis move— the picture of the Lucian crown that everyone expected to see— and remembered the stolen moments of practise when he was sweeping Noctis across that dance floor. Across the dusty floor in the shadow of Ravatogh, laughing as they planned a quiet getaway among the hot springs. Sweeping through the shadows of the overheated room in Lestallum, their jackets abandoned to the stacks of chairs. He had seen Noctis smiling and laughing and blushing beneath his attentions, flustered as Nyx pulled him across the more humble floors of barns still littered with scraps of hay. 

They had their stolen moments— laughing, teasing, slipping across polished floors and tripping across uneven planks— while the rest of the kingdom would only see the distorted reflection. 

Nyx smiled softly as he watched Noctis slip from partner to partner, passing between them with the ease of his station. 

Beneath the lights and the growing wave of the festive events, Noctis was a picture-perfect Crown Prince. 

Back in the quiet shadows of Nyx’s little apartment, with the beat of the music from the bar beneath his floors driving their steps, Nyx knew that he would see the real Noctis. The real Prince, with his soft smile and quiet demeanour, swaying with him through the shadows. Steps light in Nyx’s dimmed lights, the space between them easily narrowing until they were no longer following the steps trained into them and practised across the kingdom. 

“Didn’t know you could waltz, hero.”

“You’re a good teacher, little star.”


End file.
